Thought for the Day:
Ole, Ole, Ole
Ryders of the Storm
I would imagine that the cardio-thoracic unit of Newport Hospital has been running at full stretch because if ever a sporting event was likely to give someone a heart attack, it was the final day of the 38th Ryder Cup. It seems as if this past week has had more twists and turns than Hampton Court Maze, and offered more excitement than a blindfolded drive through Paris in the middle of rush-hour. For us Europeans, watching that stunning Sunday performance when our players seized five-and-a-half points from a possible six, was almost too good to be true. To then see them play the first three hours or so of the singles in such authorative style that they opened up a significant and comfortable margin of advantage was even better.
But then, of course, as they almost always do on the final day of a Ryder Cup, the Americans dug deep and started clawing themselves back into contention – I swear they have a greater capacity to rise from the dead than Lazarus. It started in the top match when the magnificent Lee Westwood, who must be one of the coolest men on the planet, played the only two bad holes he has played all week, and Steve Stricker, who was pretty special himself in fourballs and foursomes (and let’s face it, he needed to be with Tiger Woods as a partner), seized a grip of the match that he would not relinquish. In the third game Luke Donald, who was comfortably ahead of Jim Furyk, found himself pegged back and ended up being grateful for a one-up win. Ross Fisher was on cruise control before it all went pear-shaped and he lost by 3&2 to Jeff Overton; Francesco Molinari was two up against Tiger Woods but lost 4&3 and of course his brother parred the last four holes, and lost them all, to Rickie Fowler, and was delighted finally to come away with half a point.
The winners
• Lee Westwood, Steve Stricker, Stewart Cink, Luke Donald, Ian Poulter, Rory McIlroy, Jeff Overton, both Molinaris, Rickie Fowler and Graeme McDowell all added a little more lustre to their impressive CVs
• Colin Montgomerie got most things right, and the eventual victory will save him, I suspect, from too much criticism for picking a demonstrably out-of-form Padraig Harrington as one of his wild cards
• Celtic Manor 2010 course. There are very few layouts in the UK that would have survived the meteorological onslaught of the first three days and still been playable
• Lee Westwood, Luke Donald and Steve Stricker (again), for showing that it is possible to play extraordinarily well without a frenzy of fist-pumps, shouts of ‘C’mon’ and other attempts to whip the galleries into a maelstrom of pumped-up, banshee screaming.
The losers
• Dustin Johnson and Bubba Watson, in particular, looked as if they would rather be anywhere else, while Martin Kaymer just fell apart in the singles, allowing Johnson to trounce him by the biggest margin of the day, 6&4
• Tiger Woods enhanced his reputation as a surly, ungracious, unsmiling egotist who would frankly be quite happy to never have to play another Ryder Cup in his life
• The US PGA Tour: For scheduling the Fed-Ex Cup playoffs so that the Ryder Cup had to be pushed back in the calendar, creating the first ever Monday finish in history
• The courtesy of shaking your opponent’s hand/s first when a match is decided seems to be disappearing – far too often the victorious team-mates hugged or high-fived each other, or in the singles, their caddy, before turning to the beaten opponent/s
• Corey Pavin for being unable to read from an autocue (the screens of which were, admittedly, at 90° to either side of him) and therefore omitting to introduce Stewart Cink in the opening ceremony
• Sun Mountain, whose rain gear for the US team not only made the players look like a bunch of sink estate chavs in shellsuits, but didn’t keep them dry
The surprises
• Martin Kaymer proved himself to be human after all
The predictables
• Tiger Woods was carried by Steve Stricker in the partner formats but when it came to his own, personal reputation – that is, the singles – he showed us how good he can be when he’s motivated, at one point being eight-under par through 11 holes.
• Jim Furyk is never beaten until the winning putt drops
• The opening ceremony just about finished before midnight
• The constant ‘How good,’ ‘how excited’, ‘how thrilling’ questions asked of winners after a match, the most ludicrous example being Tim Barter to Peter Hanson: ‘How loud were the cheers in Sweden when you holed that putt?’
Reasons to be grateful
• Well, we won
• It was damned exciting
• And no-one in the closing ceremony said the true winner was the game of golf
Shot of the week
Peter Hanson, from the water hazard at the side of the 15th in Sunday’s fourballs. He put it to four feet and holed the putt for a vital half so that he and Miguel Angel Jimenez can beat Watson and Overton 2 up.
Quote of the week
Interviewer (on first morning fourballs): ‘Why are Tiger Woods and Steve Stricker going out in the third match?’
Corey Pavin: ‘Because the first two slots are already taken.’